Secular Trans Feminism

About Zinnia Jones

My work focuses on insights to be found across transgender sociology, public health, psychiatry, history of medicine, cognitive science, the social processes of science, transgender feminism, and human rights, taking an analytic approach that intersects these many perspectives and is guided by the lived experiences of transgender people. I live in Orlando with my family, and work mainly in technical writing.

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Catholic bishop pulls a “think of the children”

In an interview with the Catholic News Agency, Bishop Salvatore Cordileone of the Oakland Diocese cited the flawed and widely criticized Regnerus study as evidence that “Children do best with a mother and a father.” Not content with unjustly impugning the parenting ability of same-sex couples, he proceeded to claim that same-sex marriage is itself “unjust to children”:

The legalization of “gay marriage” in America, even on a civil level, is unjust to children and poses a threat to religious liberty, warned Bishop Salvatore J. Cordileone of Oakland, Calif.

“Marriage is the only institution we have that connects children to their mothers and fathers,” he said. “So really, the question is, do you support that institution?” […]

“Marriage is about fundamental justice for children,” he said. “Children do best with a mother and a father.”

Cordileone apparently saw no need to explain how same-sex couples being legally married would in any way prevent marriage from continuing to fulfill its alleged role in “connecting children to their mothers and fathers”. (Nor did he explain how legal prohibition of same-sex marriage would serve to prevent same-sex couples from raising children anyway.) He seems to be under the impression that marriage can only perform one function, and any role for marriage in addition to its “connecting” purpose must compromise that original function. This zero-sum model of marriage does not reflect reality.

If an opposite-sex couple has no children and does not intend to have any, or they have children from previous relationships, their choice to marry does no damage to anyone else’s marriage. No other family will falter, no connection between parents and their children will be severed, just because two people got married and did not conform to Cordileone’s favored “two biological parents” model. Cordileone may believe that no one should be having children out of wedlock, divorcing, remarrying, or doing anything that would separate a child from their biological parents. But we don’t see the Catholic Church making any organized effort to campaign against divorce, remarriage, single parenthood, sex or childbearing outside of marriage, or even same-sex parenting itself, in the realm of civil law. They have only chosen to make same-sex marriage an issue to fight in the legal sphere. This has absolutely no relevance to any of Cordileone’s goals, even within his own system of beliefs.

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About the author

My work focuses on insights to be found across transgender sociology, public health, psychiatry, history of medicine, cognitive science, the social processes of science, transgender feminism, and human rights, taking an analytic approach that intersects these many perspectives and is guided by the lived experiences of transgender people. I live in Orlando with my family, and work mainly in technical writing.

18 thoughts on “Catholic bishop pulls a “think of the children””

How did god’s children cope over the millenia, with so many parents dying before their children reached maturity? There were tons of children being raised by single parents, uncles and or aunts, neighbors, etc. Why didn’t god care until this past century about the “two biological parents” model?

It’s always so validating to see the largest institutionalised baby-trafficking ring in history continue with its unblemished record of breathtaking hypocrisy by tacitly (or explicitly) condemning adoption.

Well, he and the organization that he represents certainly know how to look after The Children, given their track record of sexual activity with children…clearly he has no sense of irony or hypocrisy, or he and his organization would have learned to STFU many years ago.

We do, however, see the Church making an organized effort to interfere with birth control and abortion access, and we see them openly encouraging unhappily pregnant women to give birth and place the newborns for adoption. Which means they have no problem with children living with couples who are biologically unrelated to them. They just don’t want those couples to be gay.

“Marriage is the only institution we have that connects children to their mothers and fathers,”

Where on earth did he get this from? A child likely doesn’t even know what marriage is and whether their parents are married until they reach a certain age. How about the love that their parent(s) show them being the main connection? Why do we need an institution for that?

On an entirely unrelated topic, does anyone know of a web filter which looks out for words like “bishop” and adds on a notice that says “warning: the following illogical arguments may cause your brain to explode”?

I’d like to know why it’s more important to protect his concept of religious liberty than it is to protect everyone’s religious liberty. Because obviously, if you exercise your freedom of religion to marry your same-sex partner in a civil ceremony and then choose to raise children, you’re doin it rong.

I’ve often wondered about the implied condemnation of adoption. As an adoptee I tend to be a little sensitive to this sort of thing. I never knew, or wanted to know, my biological parents. My parents were the people who raised and loved me full stop.

The breathtaking hipocracy of Catholics and other religious bigots proclaim the necessity of being raised by two biological parents while at the same time pushing adoption as a alternative to abortion. Basically they are all about control and maintaining their own privelge and power. They feel perfectly justified in lying to accomplish that end.

My guy and I have mentioned to our kids that we’re married, and told humorous stories about the event. But they’ve never seen the certificate, and never will: it got lost in one of our many moves. For a USA wedding, absent the certificate, how would anyone know? How could anyone check?

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